Draft, Trades, Waivers

Every team in every sport seems to have at least one player who does all the dirty work, but rarely gets much notoriety. Fittingly or not, the acronym for the Most Underrated Player is MUP. Even sounds like a designated tag with little respect. Underrated players are part of every professional basketball team. We want to show a little love to those players who seem to play under-the-radar, never getting much press time. Here is our take on the most underrated player on every NBA roster. Atlanta Hawks – The Hawks are young, so there isn’t a long game history for much of their roster. One player who has a very long history is Vince Carter. The savvy veteran has stepped in to start eight games thus far, and undoubtedly adds a voice of experience to the Atlanta locker room. Boston Celtics – There are three players who fit the mold as underrated for Boston. Aron Baynes and Terry Rozier don’t get the same limelight as the Celtic superstars. But, when there’s a scramble for a loose ball, you may well find #36 at the bottom. Marcus Smart is actually second on the team in dimes as well, and…

Under The Radar Forwards That Fantasy Basketball Team Owners Should Keep An Eye OnContents1 Under The Radar Forwards That Fantasy Basketball Team Owners Should Keep An Eye On2 Dorian Finney-Smith, Dallas Mavericks3 Wendell Carter, Jr. Chicago Bulls4 Pascal Siakam, Toronto Raptors5 James Ennis III, Houston Rockets6 Mike Muscala, Philadelphia 76ers The NBA season has officially gotten started, and there have already been many exciting story lines so far. One of the top story lines in the early part of the NBA season is the offensive surge around the league. Teams are scoring at a higher rate than ever before, thanks to the pace and space league wide philosophy. This is an exciting development for fantasy basketball owners, as each team now has multiple high upside options. With that being said, here is a look at some waiver wire pickups to consider adding to your team. Dorian Finney-Smith, Dallas Mavericks Finney-Smith is an athletic wing player who has shown a lot of potential in his first two years in Dallas. However, Finney-Smith’s jumper has been a major liability during his first two years in the league, as he shot under 40 percent along with a low three point percentage during his…

Draft Day Strategy

When it comes to draft day, keep high precedence on filling out your roster with star talents. Most of the league’s older players will come with some sort of injury designation as a pre-cautionary measure, often keeping some drafters off these guys. These designations are often utilized to protect the player and the team owner. More often than not, these tags are removed at the beginning of the season. This begs the drafter to scroll through their draft board and view the informational pieces surrounding that player in terms of recent news. Sometimes these designations come at the digression of a personal matter a player is facing and no injury concern exists. It pays to read up on these points to understand what players will slip due to the fact that they had to fly back home to be with their significant other as they birthed their first child. The ‘Q’ designation needs to be reviewed before the assumption of a 50/50 chance of playing is made. This is more geared towards daily fantasy play, but this information applies at all forms of play.

Draft day also represents a prime opportunity for an owner to take advantage of positioning types. Within most scoring systems and league hosts, players are limited to only two positions of play. For example, a smaller power forward may be listed as SF/PF. A tall forward could also fill the center position, often adopting these two areas of play in their fantasy bio. This is where the user stands to gain some ground. Take Lebron James or the Greek Freak from the Bucks. On their respective teams, both players could be slotted from the 1-4 position on any given night. Most sites that host drafts will adopt these patterns into their role selections, sometime affording a player 3 separate areas of play within all fantasy formats. This brings the user a greater sense of flexibility because it increases the coverage the user hosts at the different positional areas of play. Drafting players with the 3-tool designation reduces the pressures placed on a user to stuff their lineup with talents. Jimmy Butler, Iman Shumpert, and others have all adorned this 3-way contribution stance. These player types are often seen going higher in drafts to increase the coverage for the user. Drafting these players high is a conservative approach in early rounds. If players that feature this 3-posiiton mention slip past their recommended area of draft, this is where the user can locate their diamond in the rough or the perfect fill-in talent when their other playmakers are off, sidelined, or not playing.

Trades

Trades also hold different levels of importance when spread across the different league types. Daily fantasy basketball features the most limited impact in terms of trades. The grey area for this type of play is when a player is traded, it often takes 24 hours for that transaction to show in the player pool. For example, participating in daily fantasy play around the trade deadline is fighting fire with gasoline. Player pools are created at the beginning of the day. If a transaction occurs before or after the start of the contest, that player no longer represents the team they are listed on with daily fantasy sports sites. This equates to a zero in the points column and is an automatic elimination for contention in larger contests.

Trading within leagues can also be beneficial for owners. Some players are only listed for one primary position. This is often the case for point guards and centers. Most power forwards and shooting guards will feature a secondary position out of the 5. Hassan Whiteside, for example, is listed as a true center in most league formats. A proposed trade of a player that fills 2 different position types can help you fill out your areas of need in weekly formats and keeper leagues. If you receive a proposed trade of a dual position player for your singular asset and they both pass the test for the starter role, 9 times out of 10 it will be beneficial for you to accept this trade. This will help you gain weekly flexibility with your roster and help you fill voids that cannot be occupied by these singular assets.

Waiver Wire

The waiver wire often presents the user with a chance to bolster their roster with up-and-coming talents. Drafts often eliminate the star players, but they often lack the inclusion of breakout talents. Waiver wires allow users to claim these performers at different league requirements. Some leagues feature a payroll that allows the user to submit claims in terms of monetary value. Users are often granted $100-$200 for the course of the season to claim players and drop players. Submitting a claim often relates first to the user’s record on the season. The lowest win percentage players often get first dibs on a player, but the bidding format can change this outlook. If a user claims a player for $10 out of their $100 budget, but another user increases that bid to $15, the highest bidder will be awarded the player. This bankroll management skill is utilized in season-long and keeper league formats. The user will often have to guess in terms of bidding, making it an interesting claims process for these league types.